Outcomes of Unplanned Extubations in a Large Children’s Hospital

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Unplanned extubation (UE) is defined as unintentional dislodgement of an endotracheal tube (ETT) from the trachea. UEs can lead to instability, cardiac arrest, and may require emergent tracheal re-intubation. As part of our hospital-wide quality improvement (QI) work, a multidisciplinary committee reviewed all UEs to determine contributing factors and evaluation of clinical outcomes to develop QI interventions aimed to minimize UEs. The objec-tive was to investigate occurrence, contributing factors, and clinical outcomes of UEs in the pediatric ICU (PICU), cardiac ICU (CICU), and neonatal ICU (NICU) in a large academic children’s hospital. We hypothesized that these would be substantially different across 3 ICUs. METHODS: A single-center retrospective review of UEs in the PICU, CICU, and NICU was recorded in a prospective database for the last 5 y. Consensus-based standardized operational definitions were developed to capture contributing factors and adverse events associated with UEs. Data were extracted through electronic medical records by 3 respiratory therapists and local Virtual Pediatric Systems (VPS) database. Consistency of data extraction and classification were evaluated. RESULTS: From January 2016–December 2021, 408 UEs in 339 subjects were reported: PICU 52 (13%), CICU 31 (7%), and NICU 325 (80%). The median (interquartile range) of age and weight was 2.0 (0–4.0) months and 5.3 (3.0–8.0) kg. Many UE events were not witnessed (54%). Common contributing factors were routine nursing care (no. 5 70, 18%), ETT retaping (no. 5 62, 16%), and being held (no. 5 15, 3.9%). The most common adverse events with UE were desaturation < 80% (33%) and bradycardia (22.8%). Cardiac arrest occurred in 12%. Sixty-seven percent of UEs resulted in re-intubation within 72 h. The proportion of re-intubation across 3 units was significantly different: PICU 62%, CICU 35%, NICU 71%, P < 70% and variable across the units.